A Dangerous Captive (Completed)

19. Sugar Daddy

Song: Therefore I Am - Billie Eilish

(edited)

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Adelaide

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I didn't stop when I heard Malcolm's voice shout after me but that didn't mean that his words didn't follow me throughout the day, making sure that I couldn't concentrate on anything else.

Even when I laid in bed that night, hopelessly trying to slip into a rousing sleep, his words rang over and over in my head like a broken record.

"They're watching."

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They're watching, they're watching, they're watching, they're watching.

His words crept into my every thought for the next few days. 

Questions of his vague statement crowded my mind, who was watching? Why were they watching me? What were they gaining from it?

Is there something going on here that I don't know about?

I only talked to Malcolm when necessary, hoping that t would ease my fears about what he said but it, in fact, did the opposite. 

The same treatment went to Romano who was under the impression that I was still angry at him for speaking up against me. 

I hadn't told him what I had learned yet.

I needed to calculate the consequences before I acted. 

Jamie was the only person I had been talking to regularly, going over various people's background information together and discussing who would be the most likely to screw the operation up.

He had done well in compiling the information.

I had been distracting myself by going out into the gardens more often and exploring the massive compound that the house was located on, though I actively avoided the rose bush and the elusive gardener that knew much more than he let on.

They're watching.

I abruptly stopped in my path as his words travelled through my consciousness yet again.

I needed to do something.

I rushed into the house to try and track down Romano but abruptly bumped into something.

"I-I'm so sorry, ma'am." Lissa stuttered, making me inwardly sigh.

Was I that terrifying?

"It's fine, do you know where Romano is?" I took a step back, leaving her bubble of personal space to hopefully ease the tension she felt when she was around me.

"In his office ma'am." She stated, her eyes still trained to the ground as if it was the most interesting thing she had seen all day.

My lips quirked down involuntarily. 

She scurried away down through a maze of doorway and I took a breath before slowly climbing up the stairway, trying desperately to ignore the fluttering butterflies desperately trying to make themselves known.

I shouldn't be nervous, I told myself. It was just Mano. And yet, the fluttering didn't dissipate as I hoped they would.

I needed to squash this crush before it grew into something more.

My knuckles softly rapped against the wooden door as I waited to be let in. 

I drew a deep breath trying to stabilize my steadily increasing heart rate, succeeding in doing so until the door opened and his brown eyes met mine.